


Christmas Party Bullshit

by ClaraxBarton



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: BAMF Natasha Romanov, Canon Divergent, Christmas Party, Hawkeye Clint Barton, M/M, Modern Bucky Barnes, stupid sweaters, winterhawk - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 03:52:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17015172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClaraxBarton/pseuds/ClaraxBarton
Summary: Clint hates Christmas. Clint hates Christmas parties. Clint isn't even sure he's ever BEEN to a Christmas party before.A thing I wrote on tumblr a few days ago - NOW BETA READ!!!





	Christmas Party Bullshit

**Author's Note:**

> As always, all the thanks to Ro for beta reading. It's kind of ridiculous and sad how much you improve my writing. But damn am I grateful for it.

#  Christmas Party Bullshit

It had been Tony’s idea.

 

So, immediately, half the team had been against it.

 

But, in the end, even Cap came around to Tony’s line of thinking.

 

Mingle with the Stark Tech employees. Prove the Avengers are human. Free PR. Good PR. Controllable PR.

 

Technically, it wasn’t a Christmas party. That’s what Pepper insisted.

 

Tony just nodded and added a giant menorah to the list of decorations. And then started mumbling something about the Winter Solstice and a light show.

 

Clint didn’t really care - after all, his plans for Tony’s “festive winter party” hadn’t changed since the moment Tony announced it.

 

Avoid at all costs.

 

And he was well on his way to accomplishing that goal, even going so far as to collect data on possible AIM cells from Hill and set himself up with some nice intel-gathering that should have lasted well past Tony’s projected festivities.

 

Except that Natasha was a damn traitor, and showed up at his apartment wearing-

 

“What the fuck happened to you?” Clint demanded as he finally tore his gaze away from the knitted reindeer frolicking on her sweater and looked her in the eyes.

 

She didn’t look like a robot. Didn’t look brainwashed. But-

 

Natasha threw something at his face, and Clint instinctively ducked.

 

She crossed her arms and tapped one booted foot impatiently.

 

Clint picked up the projectile - it was another sweater.

 

A lavender sweater - solid color choice - decorated in snowflakes of alternating sizes. There was even a snowman in the middle of it all.

 

It wasn’t… the worst thing ever. But it was still a knitted holiday sweater.

 

“I’m working,” Clint vaguely gestured towards his laptop and the half-eaten pizza beside it.

 

“I can throw the laptop out of the window and drag you with me, or I can leave your laptop undamaged and drag you with me.”

 

Clint sighed and, maintaining as much eye contact as possible so that she would KNOW how much this hurt, he pulled on the sweater.

 

Natasha nodded and smoothed it over his shoulders.

 

“Good. I thought I had your shoulder span right.”

 

“My- You MADE this?”

 

She lifted one delicate eyebrow in response.

 

“I love it,” Clint rushed to say to the woman who routinely trounces him in sparring matches. “It’s stunning. Breathtaking. So gorgeous.”

 

—

 

“Your sweater is stupid.”

 

It was two hours later, and Clint had found himself a decent hiding spot that was still within easy access of the bar and allowed him almost unimpeded visual recon of the party.

 

Clint’s spot was being invaded.

 

By a scruffy, dark-haired hipster with pale eyes, oversized glasses frames, and a green and red plaid flannel shirt that was damn near just as festive as Clint’s hand-knit-by-a-deadly-assassin stupid sweater.

 

“Fuck you,” he growled at the hipster.

 

The hipster smirked and stole a stuffed mushroom from Clint’s plate.

 

Clint glared.

 

“You’ve done that a few times already,” the hipster said, mouth full and yet somehow still managing to smirk.

 

If he wasn’t so damn sexy, Clint wouldn’t be able to stand looking at him.

 

As it was, though…

 

Clint sighed.

 

“I’m sorry about last week. I got called away and-”

 

The hipster waved off Clint’s excuse.

 

“It’s fine. We aren’t dating. We’re just fucking. You gotta cancel on me for whatever reason - it’s fine. You don’t owe me an explanation.”

 

Clint sighed.

 

This.

 

This was why he had wanted to avoid the damn party.

 

Because of this too-damn-sexy hipster right here.

 

Bucky Barnes.

 

One of Tony’s brightest young engineers, who was as sassy as he was sexy, and was about a billion times smarter than Clint thought was fair. And yet, somehow, Bucky liked him. Or, at least, Bucky liked fucking him.

 

For the past four months, they’d had a steady string of… one-night stands? Booty calls? Something. Standing hook-ups.

 

It had been Bucky, that first time, after he pulled Clint into the coffee shop bathroom and gave him a mind-blowing hand-job while saying all kinds of filthy things, to call their “thing” a no-strings-attached fuck-fest.

 

Which had been fine with Clint.

 

The first three times.

 

But then…Then, he developed feelings.

 

Feelings that hit him like the damn plague and wouldn’t go the fuck away.

 

Bucky reached over and adjusted the stupid antler headband on Clint’s head.

 

Tony had shoved it on there when he walked into the place, and Clint- Clint had been too distracted by the sight of Bucky dancing to actually pay attention. And in the two hours since, he had been doing his level best to disappear. He hadn’t given the headband a single thought.

 

“What are you doing later?” Bucky asked.

 

“You?” Clint responded hopefully.

 

Bucky smirked.

 

“Yeah. That sounds like a plan. But first…tell me what you want for Christmas.”

 

Clint didn’t celebrate the holiday. Never really had - not as a kid, not as a criminal on the run, not as a black ops government agent, not as a sad excuse for a superhero.

 

But he also had a lifetime of wanting things he couldn’t have.

 

And, hell. His days with Bucky were already numbered. The guy was going to figure out he deserved better any day now and walk away. Might as well be tonight, anyway.

 

“Go on a date with me. No sex. Just. A date. Romance and shit.”

 

Bucky stared at him.

 

And, yeah, the pitch had been awful. And if Bucky was interested in dating Clint, he would have said something about it and-

 

Bucky kissed him.

 

He tasted like cider and peppermint and chocolate, and all the flavors of all the things Clint had always longed for.

 

“About damn time you asked me out,” Bucky muttered as he pulled away from the kiss. “I was starting to think I’d have to ambush you when you were in a hospital bed before you’d let me tell you I love you.”

 

“You- you what?”

 

But Bucky just rolled his eyes and kissed Clint again.

 

“I love you,” Bucky repeated, the words a warm caress on Clint’s jaw. “I love you.”

 

Maybe, Clint thought as he grinned against Bucky's lips, maybe Christmas parties weren't the  _worst_ things ever.

 

—-

 


End file.
